Introduction

Behaviorism can be understood by the average person and can be used to remediate many problems. Behaviorism involves using a systematic approach of observing and recording behaviors and adding a systematic plan to help children understand, predict and control their environment. The principles of behaviorism, much like the principles of physics, are general and apply to all organisms. Systematic use of the laws of behavior change allows a therapist to help children grow intellectually, emotionally and socially. Behavioral laws much like physical laws apply weather you understand or believe in them or not.

After the chapter on Behaviorism we turn to discussing some developmental patterns. We believe that it is very important to understand typical developmental patters. Developmental patterns are basically complex behaviors. The question is at what level of complexity are behaviors occurring. Highly complex behaviors are considered advanced development. Yes, there are neurological changes that occur as the complexity of a child's behavior increases. Neurological development occurs as complex behaviors are learned. We do not need to wait for neurological readiness. Neurological readiness occurs as prerequisite behaviors are learned. We hope to provide new therapists with an understanding of how behaviors build upon one and other to become complex behavioral patterns. We hope that when a child can not learn a program or task that the therapist will be able to look at the child and the task and break the task into smaller or easier tasks so that they can work toward attaining the larger task.

After this background we will move into describing the building blocks of therapy, including developing environmental acceptance and promoting environmental expansion. Here a therapist learns how to develop rapport with a child. We begin to present the concept of motivation and give the therapist tools to understand and harness motivation. Motivation is a key to success as a therapist. Without understanding and being able to harness motivation a therapist and the child's program of change will flounder. As motivation is harnessed and the child moves in the direction of being motivated by more objects and activities the focus of therapy moves to building self-initiation and the ability to communicate with non-verbal gestures. Next, the child learns about contingencies and how to maximize control over the world by being responsive to contingencies.

We next move on to discuss learning to label the world based on physical characteristics. The major work of building socially derived perceptions and labeling those perceptions originally will be developed through the three stage process of providing a physical signal to the child, waiting for the appropriate behavior, and reacting to the child in a fun way when the behavior occurs. Here the child is trying to achieve a desired goal. Next, as perceptions and the ability to label and integrate labels become more complex, the therapeutic method will continue to rely on the above three step process but will begin to rely more and more on acquisition of knowledge guided by information in the form of rules.

The child is taught to perceptually make distinctions between objects and sounds based on if they are the same or different. The child learns to match 3-D to 3-D objects, 2-D to 3-D objects, 2-D to 2-D objects and then to construct, sort and pattern the objects learned. The child is then taught to receptively interact with the perceived objects and eventually to label the objects. The child learns to imitate single movements and then complex movements and eventually to imitate vocal and verbal sounds. At the same time, the child can be taught to respond to vocalizations. All of these skills culminate in the ability to request concrete objects and label concrete objects.

The stage is set for more complex behavioral patterns as the child starts to learn about the world in a more abstract sense. Relations between things are not necessarily based on physical characteristics but now are based on a socially derived (decided upon by society) meaning. Here the child can start to rely on information provided, although much learning is still based on achieving desired goals. The child is taught to relate objects and abstract ideas and to integrate objects and ideas in novel ways. At the same time, the child responds verbally to cues and then open ended questions which lead into the natural give and take flow of conversation. Next, the child starts to understand abstract social relations and gains a more abstract understanding of self and others.

The child is helped to move through developmental stages by harnessing natural motivation and using a systematic approach to progress them through adaptive stages of functioning. In other words a child develops more complex behavior patterns and his or her behavior patterns become more functional at solving problems in the child's world. Behaviors at this stage could be physical behavior patterns or the manipulation of verbal behavior patterns to accomplish goals in the world.

We close with a discussion of special topics highlighting certain challenges facing children with autism and their therapists. Attention and the direction of attention to socially appropriate objects and people in the world is one of the biggest keys to a successful outcome. We will give special attention to attention. Next the discussion turns to self-stimulation or as we prefer to call it self-soothing behaviors. Self-soothing behaviors are very distressing to parents and often set the child apart obviously from their peers. Finally we provide background neurological information in the appendix for people that are interested in more information about the information processing model we use when assessing a child's challenges.

Programs are presented at the table to structure the learning periods. Play therapy is used throughout as a general rule between programs. We rely on increasing interactive patterns and teaching the child how to play with developmentally appropriate toys on down time between programs. Programs are also presented in a play format when possible, using the child's natural motivation and interest in the world. All programs are taught with the overall emphasis of guiding the child to the next higher level of adaptive functioning. Building attention, self-control, interest in the physical world and abstract world of thought and language is an ongoing focus, realizing that all of this comes to fruition through the most important aspect of life and therapy, the development of a deep, emotionally engaged relationship with other people.